The agents had boarded up every opening and slept in shifts. But Groversville's horrors had not coming calling since Oakley's death. Morning finally broke.

Guppy perked up. "I think I hear vehicles!"

They moved one of the desks out of the way of the office window. Sunlight streamed through.

At the bottom of Skyline Road, a large vehicle drove into view, and the sound of its laboring engine grew louder.

There were three large vehicles. They crawl slowly up the long, sloped street towards Merle's Shut Eye Motel.

Leading the procession was a gleaming, white motor home, a lumbering thirty-six foot behemoth that was somewhat modified. It had no doors or windows along its flank. The only entrance was at the back. The curved, wraparound windshield of the cab was tinted very dark and was made of much thicker glass than that used in ordinary motor homes. There was no identification on the vehicle, no project name, no indication that it Majestic property.

Behind the first motor home came a second. Bringing up the rear was an unmarked truck pulling a thirty-foot, plain gray trailer. Even the truck's windows were tinted, armor-thick glass.

The payload in the motor homes and in the truck was obviously quite heavy. Their engines strained hard, and they ground their way up the street, moving slower than ten miles an hour, then slower than five, inching, groaning, grinding.

When at last they reach Merle’s, they kept on going, made a right-hand turn at the corner, and swung into the cross street that flanked the motel.